Things to Know Before You Babysit
by MandaB
Summary: Sirius is back, learning yet again. Only this time, he's been babysitting little Harry. RR please


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One of these days I will learn. When Lily says No, that means 'Sirius you idiot don't do that.' But until I learn, she's going to keep making me write these bloody things. Why can she still make me do that you ask? Because a mother, be it yours or someone else's, can you make you do anything, and you have no say in the matter. 

You see Lily is now the mother of my little godson, Harry James. Cute name, but it gave James a big ego again, about the little guy being named after him. I know your asking yourself 'Ok, what has that got to do with anything?' See James decided to take Lily out to dinner to help her unwind. Having a baby and not sleeping for three months is just not good. So being godfather, I got asked to baby-sit. Well, it was an interesting sight. I learned things yet again, and I know, your dying to know what it is. 

1. Do not tease the new mommy right before she leaves you with her child. 

James had called Sirius earlier in the week to ask if he would baby-sit 5 month old Harry, and Sirius had quickly agreed. So at 7 p.m. that Friday night, Sirius apparated into Godric's Hollow. What he arrived to was James trying to coax a frazzled Lily into putting down the baby so they could leave. "James I do not want to leave Harry with Sirius! What if he needs me?!" At this, Sirius made his presence known. "Gee Lils, thanks for your confidence." Sirius said sarcastically. James grinned as Lily blushed. "Sirius it's not that I don't trust you, it's just Harry's my baby and I don't want to leave him because he may need me-" she rambled. Luckily James stopped her. "Honey, Harry will be fine. Sirius is perfectly capable of babysitting for a couple of hours." "James your talking about leaving my baby, MY BABY, with a man who thought it was ok to start a fire in a tent!" Lily said, leaning towards hysterical. "Lily I resent that! You knew I wasn't a muggle and no one told me I couldn't do otherwise!" Sirius defended. Lily handed baby Harry to him and apologized. 

"Sorry Sirius. Ok, his bottles are already made just say a little heating charm before you feed him. He gets one bottle every hour and a half, and be sure to check his diaper every half hour. He goes to bed at 9:30 because he slept late today. There are blocking charms on all electrical outlets and watch him closely because he crawls out of his crib." "Lils, your rambling again. Sirius and Harry will be fine. Let's go." James said calmly. "Yeah Lils, go have fun. Harry and I will just hang out here, drink some butterbeer, have a couple of ladies over won't we Harry?" Sirius said as he looked down at his little godson. At this Lily's eyes went wide. "I changed my mind, I'm not going anywhere. Give me my baby." James glared at Sirius and whacked him in the head. "Hey hey! Don't hit the man with the baby!" Sirius defended. Little Harry gave a giggle and Lily glared at Sirius. "Sirius, you ever joke about doing anything with my baby besides what I tell you to, I swear on Godric Gryffindor's grave that I will make sure you and Bella are never able to make little Sirius'. Understand?" All Sirius could do was nod and swear to have Harry in bed by 9:20. 

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2. Make sure that when you feed a baby strained anything, both of you wear a bib. 

After Lily and James finally left, Sirius walked into the kitchen and set Harry in his high chair. "Ok Harry, strained pumpkins or strained squash with your bottle?" Sirius asked as he reached into the refrigerator. Harry makes a cooing sound and banged his tiny fist on his table. "Ok, strained pumpkin it is." Sirius said, and he prepared Harry his dinner.

About 5 minutes later, after Sirius finally figured out how to tie a bib onto Harry, he say down to feed the baby. "Ok Harry, open wide." Sirius said as he aimed a spoonful of strained pumpkin at Harry's mouth. Harry on the other hand, had other ideas, messier ones. Half an hour and one jar of strained pumpkin later, baby Harry was full and Sirius was covered in bright orange. 

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3. Wait awhile after the baby eats to play toss up. Unless your one of those freak people that like being covered in baby spew.

"Ok little guy, let's play a game. You want to play toss up?" Sirius asked, once he had cleaned up. Sirius had worn muggle clothing, jeans and a white t-shirt and it was stained a bright orange. Harry made a gurgling noise that Sirius took for a yes. So Sirius tossed Harry up in the air, caught him, and blew raspberries on his little baby belly. Harry laughed and the game continued for about 5 minutes. Until Harry got that look on his face that almost every baby has at least once in his life. The look that let you know, baby Harry's food wants to make a reappearance. All over Sirius. Well, after that, Sirius no longer played toss up, and baby Harry slowly turned back to normal from green. 

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4. Do not let the baby hold the wand. It is not a pretty sight. 

Sirius had set down his wand on the small coffee table in the living room. Baby Harry started crawling around the living room, and when he reached the coffee table he pulled himself up. Sirius was watching Harry the whole time and thought it was cute when Harry grabbed the wand off of the table. He figured it was ok to let him play with it, since Harry couldn't talk yet. No talking, no harm.

Harry crawled over to Sirius and made the motion for Sirius to lift him up. Smiling Sirius bent over to pick up his little godson. "What do you have there Harry? Is that Uncle Sirius' wand?" James had taught Harry from day one to know Remus and Sirius as 'Uncle'. Peter had not been around as much as the others, so he didn't bother to teach Harry 'Uncle Peter'. Sirius placed the five month old on the couch next to him and watched him. Harry swished the wand around and made gurgling noises, which made Sirius laugh. "Your too little to do spells and such just yet little guy. Wait till you get to Hogwarts." Harry laughed too, but for an entirely different reason that Sirius didn't notice until he walked past a mirror. 

"Remus? REMUS!" Sirius yelled through the floo network. "Padfoot would you wait one minute to let me get in the room?" Remus yelled back. Once he entered the room, it took every ounce he had to not burst out in laughter. "Sirius what happened to you?" he asked. With a purple with neon green polka dots face, with little snitches and bludgers chasing each other on top of that, Sirius just calmly said, "Well how was I supposed to know baby talk can make a wand work? Just fix it."

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5. Do NOT under any circumstance EVER give a baby coffee flavored anything. EVER.

"Ok little guy, your mommy and daddy will be gone for a few more hours. So they'll never know, you want some Bertie Bott's Beans?" Sirius asked the baby. Harry made a cooing noise and reached for the bag Sirius held. The bag was safe, full of coffee, sugar, cherry, strawberry and watermelon flavored beans. Sirius carefully fed one to Harry, who upon receiving the bean, went wide eyed. Grinning broadly, he reached his tiny fist into the bag for more. Within ten minutes, all coffee flavored beans were gone, along with the sugar ones.

"REMUS! I NEED YOU AGAIN!" Sirius yelled through the floo network for the second time that night. "What did you do this time?" Remus asked as he grabbed his wand, and laid his robe on a kitchen chair. He wouldn't be needing it, his muggle clothes would be fine. "You'll see when you get here, just hurry." And with that Sirius pulled his head out of the fire. Realizing it must be important, Remus quickly got over to the house. 

When he arrived he seen a frazzled looking Sirius sitting in the middle of the floor, surrounded by various toys, a couple of knocked over lamps, and various baby clothes. "Sirius-" Remus started, but was cut off in shock when a naked Harry when streaking by. "When did he learn to run?" Remus asked, not knowing the small boy could even pull himself up, let alone run. "By about the fourth bag of coffee flavored Bertie Bott's." Sirius answered. Remus stared. "What in the name of Merlin possessed you to give that child coffee anything?!" Sirius just shook his head. "Moony, you were the brains not me. It didn't even cross my mind that it could be a bad thing until the kid got all bug eyed and bouncing. I swear he almost walked up a wall! I don't know what to do, but if we don't do something before James and Lily get back I'm going to be castrated." Remus sat down next to Sirius and the two thought of something to do, while a still naked Harry streaked through the living room and kitchen screaming, "BEANS BEANS!" at the top of his little lungs.

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6. Body Binds do NOT calm a child down. You may as well give the child more coffee beans.

"What we need to do is make him sit still." Sirius said after five minutes of thought. Harry was still running through the two rooms, still yelling beans. "Ok, but how?" Remus asked. "Well, we need to catch him." Sirius said. The two men got up and tried to catch Harry as he came through. They failed miserably and Harry, who thought this was a new game, began to run faster and giggle more. So, the two men started to run after the little boy. It took the better half of fifteen minutes to catch the little bugger, and when the finally did Sirius put him in a body bind. "Lily is going to kill you." Remus told Sirius, as he watched Sirius lay the boy on the couch. "Probably, but after a few minutes of sitting still Harry will calm down some." Famous last words of Sirius Black. 

When he released the baby from the body bind, Harry turned to his godfather, grinned, bopped him the head with a toy bludger club, threw up the beans he had eaten, and started to run again.

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7. Diapers should be illegal, that or babies should be able to change themselves. 

Once Harry finally calmed down a little, he was covered in some kind of purple goo (having gotten a hold of Sirius's wand again) and was wearing a diaper. Remus and Sirius were wondering what the goo was before they could get him dressed again. As they were discussing it, Remus started to make a face. "Sirius, have you changed Harry's diaper tonight?" he asked. "No, he had a clean one on when I got here and he's been running around naked for about an hour. You don't think he needs changed do you?" Sirius asked. Remus nodded his head and Sirius went to check the diaper. He walked over to Harry picked him up, checked the diaper and proceeded to gag. "Oh good lord Moony. What in the world do they feed this kid?!" Sirius exclaimed, going a little green. "You're the one that fed him coffee flavored beans Sirius." Remus pointed out. "Oh come on Moony change this diaper for me please?!" Sirius said starting to beg. "No way. I'll help you baby-sit, clean, watch the kid, and pass you the diaper and wipes. But I refuse to change him." Remus said. Sirius grumbled a fine and the three proceeded up the stairs to change the diaper.

After twenty minutes, much gagging, and three torn diapers later, baby Harry was changed and cleaned up. Of course the only one who found the humor in the two now green faced men, was little Harry.

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8. When the daddy calls via floo to let you know they'll be home in half an hour clean like hell. And yes, two completely trashed rooms can be cleaned that quick.

"Is everything going ok Sirius?" James asked. "Oh just fine Prongs. Remus got, uh, bored and came over for awhile. Figured you wouldn't care." Sirius said, trying to block James from seeing into the room. "That's fine, you know I wouldn't care. Tell Moony to stick around for a bit and we can all talk when I get home. We're almost ready to come home. Lily wanted to stop and see her parents for a little bit, and I just borrowed their fireplace to check on you guys so she wouldn't have complete heart failure. I'll let her know everything's alright and we'll be home soon." Sirius said good-bye and James head popped out of the fireplace. "MOONY!" he bellowed, "We have to clean FAST!" 

It took the two friends twenty minutes to clean up the kitchen and living room. They found goo in the craziest places, baby toys in places that a baby shouldn't be able to reach, and a wet diaper hidden behind the couch. When the cleaning was finally done, they started in on Harry.

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9. Always make sure the baby is as clean as it was before the parents left.

"Moony, this kid has James's hair. It won't lay down or comb out very well! It's just impossible!" Sirius said. "Wow…I felt really ..feminine. Tell no one about that or I will have you hexed into the next millennium." Remus just laughed and they quickly finished washing the baby. After they did that, Remus took the child to get him dresses and Sirius cleaned up the newly made mess in the bathroom. 

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10. Never tell on yourself. If the parents think everything went well, leave it at that. DO NOT OPEN YOUR MOUTH.

When James and Lily arrived back home they found Sirius and Remus sitting on the couch, baby Harry between them, all three watching a muggle game show. "Hello mommy's little angel!" Lily cooed as she picked up the baby. "Angel?! ANGEL?! That kid is no angel! He makes the marauders look like abused house elves!" Sirius exclaimed. "Sirius shut up while your ahead." Remus muttered. "Lily I hope you know that while you were gone that child was a terror on two legs! I don't know how James's mother put up with us two! First my shirt is stained orange permanently because of the strained pumpkin! And Prongs, why didn't you warn me that babies can't play toss up?! Because I didn't know and I do not like being covered in baby spew. The little bugger got a hold of my wand and it took Remus and I a long time to get my face back to normal. I didn't think some flavored candy beans would hurt anything but it did! The kid ate four bags of coffee jelly beans and then threw them up on me, AFTER he ran around the house naked for God only knows how long. We put him in a body bind, to try and calm him down. Well that didn't work either. It made him more hyper if anything! And for the love of Merlin why do baby diapers have to smell so much?! I almost threw up myself! When James called Moony and I ran ourselves ragged trying to get the house cleaned up before you two got home. And you get home and call this little terror that is my godson an angel?! He's a marauder before he can even walk! I swear if Bella wants kids, their hers only. I refuse to have kids. But…I will baby-sit again." Sirius finished. 

When Sirius finished speaking, Harry was playing with his mother's necklace, James and Remus were choking on laughter and Lily was fuming. Sirius knew that look. It meant run. "Love you Lils? Little sister?" It had been a joke among the friends for years that Lily and Sirius resembled each other except for the hair and she was younger. But any jokes were now unfunny to Lily. "Well Sirius, it's a good thing you don't want kids. Because when I get done with you, you won't be able to make them, let alone have them.

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So see I learned something again. This time, babysitting skills. Quite sad I ended up getting my arse kicked by a five month old, but here we are. Lily forgave me after writing the paper and I'm forbidden to babysit without Remus or James supervision ever again. And my little godson is turning into a marauder already. I couldn't be prouder. So this is Sirius Black with things you should know before babysitting, and if you'll excuse me, Lily signed me up for one of those babysitting classes and I'm late.

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So? What do you think? Leave me a review!

MandaB


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